Research and Information Service
Briefing Note
Paper 28/14
17 February 2014
NIAR 048-14
James Stewart
The Scottish Qualification
Authority: Quality Assurance
and Governance
1. Introduction
The Scottish Qualification Authority (SQA) is the national accreditation and awarding
body in Scotland.
In its accreditation role, it accredits vocational qualifications offered across Scotland. It
also approves awarding bodies.
As an awarding body, SQA is responsible for the development and delivery of the new
National Qualifications which have been introduced to support the Scottish
Government’s Curriculum for Excellence (CfE).
This briefing note outlines the quality assurance arrangements and governance
model adopted by the SQA. It also refers to the separation of awarding and accrediting
functions and makes comparison to the system in Northern Ireland.
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2. Quality Assurance
2.1. Background
The SQA has designed a system of checks which are intended to ensure that
assessment is consistent and of high quality. This is known as verification.1
Internal verification
Centres (schools or any other approved organisations) are responsible for the internal
verification of their assessments and must have an internal system of quality checks in
place.
External verification
SQA appoints teachers/lecturers with recent experience in the delivery and
assessment of their subject to carry out external verification in centres. SQA states that
it encourages centres and staff to see verification as a valuable Quality Improvement
process.
2.2. Centre Approval and Verification
In August 2013, some changes were introduced to the way SQA quality assures
centres offering their qualifications. If a centre wishes to offer SQA qualifications it must
now go through two phases known as Approval and Verification.2
2.2.1. Approval
The first stage of approval is to confirm that the organisation has the management
structure and quality assurance system to support the assessment and internal
verification of SQA qualifications. This is called the Systems approval process.
The second stage is known as Qualification approval and considers the qualification
type that an organisation wants to offer. The process focusses on equipment, training
and assessment materials. It also considers the staff involved in delivering the
assessment and internal verification of the qualifications.
2.2.2. Verification
SQA carries out two types of verification visits known as Systems Verification and
Qualification Verification.
Systems verification involves SQA gathering information about centres to determine
how often to carry out a verification visit. Evidence can come from a variety of sources,
such as findings from previous systems verification visits or information provided by
candidates or employees.
1
SQA Website: Available at http://www.sqa.org.uk/sqa/4429.html
2
SQA Website: Available at http://www.sqa.org.uk/sqa/66052.4585.html
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Every newly approved centre receives a systems verification visit, and all SQA
approved centres are visited at least once every three years.
Qualification verification takes place to promote national consistency in assessment
decisions. SQA appoints experienced practitioners to carry out qualification verification
in centres. These practitioners have recent experience in delivering and assessing
qualification.3
A Sample verification Visit Report can be found at the following url:
http://www.sqa.org.uk/sqa/files_ccc/Qualification_Verification_Visit_Report.pdf
2.3. Quality Assurance criteria
Centres are measured against 6 categories of Quality Assurance criteria.4 These are
outlined in Table 1.
Table 1: Quality Assurance Criteria
Quality Assurance criteria
1.
Management of a Centre
3
2.
Resources
3.
Candidate support
4.
Internal assessment
and verification
5.
External assessment
6.
Records/data management
Detail
SQA requires a centre to have a fully
documented quality management system in
place to support all SQA qualifications on
offer.
The centre must ensure that it has sufficient
resources to enable candidates to achieve
the competences defined in SQA
qualifications.
This includes initial guidance on course
choice, induction and ongoing support,
certification and pre-exit advice.
Centres must have written procedures for
ensuring that all assessment decisions are
consistent with national standards, and must
maintain records of the internal verification
process.
Where qualifications include an external
assessment which is set and marked by
SQA, the responsibility for ensuring that
national standards are met lies with SQA.
SQA requires centres to maintain a fully
documented and effectively managed
system to ensure accurate data is retained
within the centre and exchanged with SQA.
SQA (2013) Guidance on Visiting Qualification Verification for Higher National and Vocational Qualifications: Available at
http://www.sqa.org.uk/sqa/files_ccc/sqapdf.v2.pdf
4
SQA (2012) Quality Assurance Criteria 2013/14
Available at http://www.sqa.org.uk/sqa/files_ccc/Quality_Assurance_Criteria_2012.pdf
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2.4. National Qualification: External Verification
SQA advises a centre if it has been chosen for verification. If selected a centres
submits entries and SQA will select a sample for verification. Centres are notified if
candidate’s work is to be sampled.
In the event of verification, a centre must compile assessment evidence for the
candidates selected. This includes details of candidates' achievement, candidates'
evidence, assessment instrument, marking instructions and internal verification
records. If a centre is selected for central verification, SQA will uplift material on a
particular date.
2.5. Higher National (HN): External Verification
The verification of Higher National qualifications is performed at Unit level (typically 40
hours of work). A Verifier reviews work in progress (incomplete evidence) during any
verification visit; sampling (where possible) a minimum of three single Units.
Some centres prefer to produce their own instruments of assessment for HN Units. In
these cases, the SQA recommend that any assessment materials are forwarded to the
Verification team for prior verification before the candidates take the assessments.
2.6. Reporting
After each round of verification activity, SQA publishes key messages that have been
identified by the assessment teams. Additionally, once all verification has been
completed for the academic session, an annual National Assessment Report is
published for each subject. This report is produced by the Principal Verifier and is
based on the findings of all verification activity that has taken place across all
verification rounds.5
3. SQA Governance
3.1. Background
A Chair and Board are appointed by the Scottish Government to manage and direct
SQA. There is also an Advisory Council appointed by the Scottish Government to
provide independent advice to Ministers and SQA.6
SQA’s Management Team is responsible to the Chair and the Board for day-to-day
operations. The Management Statement and Financial Memorandum, drawn up by the
Scottish Government Education Department in consultation with SQA, sets out the
broad framework within which SQA operates.
5
6
SQA (2014) NQ Verification 2013–14 Key Messages, Round 1
SQA (2003) Financial Statement and Financial Memorandum: Available at http://www.sqa.org.uk/files_ccc/SQA-MSFM2003.pdf
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3.2. Awarding and Accrediting Functions
Scotland: SQA
The SQA is both an awarding body and accreditor of qualifications. The Scottish
Government has given SQA the remit of accrediting any qualifications which are
offered in Scotland, with the exception of degrees. However, SQA will only accredit
qualifications offered by awarding bodies they have approved.
To facilitate the separation of awarding and accrediting functions, the Education
(Scotland) Act 1996, sets out the requirements of the accrediting function and, in
particular, the requirement to have an Accreditation Committee. The Act specifies
that the majority of members of the Accreditation Committee must be neither members
nor employees of SQA.
The Act effectively set up the Accreditation Committee as a quasi-Board. In addition,
the Main Board at SQA cannot overturn any decision made by the Accreditation
Committee. The Committee is directly accountable to Ministers for the decisions that it
makes.7
SQA have 3 Board Members on the Accreditation Committee, one of whom is the
Convenor of the Accreditation Committee. The discussions which take place at
Accreditation Committee are fed back to the Main Board by the Convenor. Minutes are
presented to the Main Board for noting.
The other members of the Accreditation Committee are drawn from a range of
employers and organisations including Rolls Royce, NHS, Education Scotland, the
Lloyds Banking Group, Scottish Water, Federation of Small Businesses, the Scottish
Prison Service and the Principal of Forth Valley College.
Standing Orders stipulate that the SQA Board has a role to play in appointing Members
to the Accreditation Committee and that it also has to approve the relevant Standing
Orders. This is designed to ensure that the Accreditation Committee functions in the
same way as other SQA committees.8
Initially, the Accreditation Committee made decisions with regards to the actual
accreditation of qualifications. However, this proved problematic. Therefore, the
Scottish Government, having taken legal advice, agreed that this action could be
devolved internally to an officer group. This group is known as the Accreditation
Coordination Group (ACG).
All members of the ACG are from the SQA accreditation unit. Essentially, the ACG
makes the accreditation decisions on behalf of the Accreditation Committee and
advises the Committee of the decisions made on its behalf.9
7
Information provided by SQA
SQA (2003) Management Statement And Financial Memorandum
9
SQA Accreditation Coordination Group Standing Orders
8
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3.3. Northern Ireland: Council for the Curriculum, Examinations and Assessment
(CCEA)
Similarly to the SQA, CCEA is both an awarding body and accreditor. CCEA is
managed by a Council that consists of a Chairman and 8 other members. The
Chairman and Council Members are ministerial appointments and typically represent
the sectors of education and the business world.10
The CCEA Council has responsibilities which include:

establishing the overall direction of CCEA

constructively challenging CCEA’s team of executives

ensuring that the Department of Education (DE) is kept informed on changes
CCEA’s strategic direction

ensuring compliance with regard to spending public funds

appointing the Chief Executive of CCEA (with Department of Education
approval)
In addition to Council, there are a number of committees. With the exception of the
Finance Committee, membership of other committees includes independent
representatives, education practitioners, the Northern Ireland Audit Office, and
auditors. The Audit & Risk Committee includes a Department of Education Observer.
The Department of Education states that the CCEA organisational structure separates
the executive responsibilities of awarding and accrediting. It is suggested that this is
enabled by the awarding organisation being led by the Director of Qualifications and
the regulation/accreditation team being led by a senior manager. Both report separately
to the Chief Executive. Additionally, all executive functions are subject to scrutiny by
committees and Council.
In April 2010, the arrangements for regulation changed in Northern Ireland:

CCEA Accreditation is the regulator for non-vocational qualifications. These
include GCSEs, GCE AS, A Levels and other General qualifications

The Office of Qualifications and Examinations Regulation (Ofqual)
regulates vocational qualifications
Ofqual is also responsible for regulating GCSEs, A levels and National Curriculum
Assessments in England. It reports directly to Parliament in Westminster and the
10
Information provided by the Department of Education
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Northern Ireland Assembly. While independent, it gives advice to Government on
qualifications and assessment.11
11
CCEA (2013) General Conditions of Recognition :Available at
http://www.rewardinglearning.org.uk/docs/accreditation/general_conditions_of_recognition_september_2013_v2.pdf
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